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Mexican drug wars devastate sleepy farm valley

Two-thirds of Valle de Juarez&rsquo;s 20,000 residents have fled since two drug cartels brought their war to this once-quiet spot on the U.S. border.

Former resident Marycarmen Madrid looks out from her family's burned home in the town of Guadalupe, Mexico. (Myles Estey / Special to the Star)

By Myles EsteySpecial to the Star

Sat., March 17, 2012

VALLE DE JUAREZ, MEXICO—Driving slowly down the empty streets of Guadalupe, former resident Marycarmen Madrid points to scorched and crumbling houses, scattered with the personal effects of former residents.

She identifies some of the hundreds killed, terrorized or forced into leaving this town on the U.S. border. Her family’s home was burned down last year, along with dozens of others, in the campaign of extreme violence and terror that has gripped the region.

Known locally as the Valle de Juarez, this was once a sleepy agricultural hub an hour east of Ciudad Juarez. Then, in 2008, the valley exploded as it became a battlefield in Mexico’s drug wars, which have claimed more than 50,000 lives.

It’s estimated more than 60 per cent of the valley’s 20,000 residents have now fled. Whole neighbourhoods are nothing but charred skeletons of houses. Of the 18 police officers who once worked in nearby Praxedis, 16 were killed between 2009 and 2010, a local official says. The severed heads of three officers were left outside Guadalupe’s municipal office.

“There are no police in Guadalupe. There is no law in Guadalupe. It’s an extreme situation,” said Gustavo de la Rosa, human rights commissioner for the state of Chihuahua. “Almost everyone has left, and those who remain are in the hands of criminals.”

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Guadalupe was traditionally under the control of the Juarez drug cartel, a.k.a. “La Linea.” But in 2008 men affiliated with Joaquin “Chapo” Guzman’s Sinaloa Federation — the most powerful cartel in Mexico — began to contest control of the sparsely populated valley, strategically located along the U.S. border.

The Sinaloans started to wipe out anyone with ties to La Linea. La Linea initially fought back, exacting revenge on anyone supporting “El Chapo.” But it was ultimately outgunned, its members killed or chased off.

“There’s relative calm right now because one gang just took out the whole other group,” said De la Rosa. “It’s like the Wild West.”

The Sinaloan mob, which has adopted the name La Nueva Gente (“The New People”), presides over the empty destroyed towns, controlling the valuable border turf. They are said to strictly regulate all outsiders. From 5 p.m. to 5 a.m., Sinaloan operatives stop any unrecognized cars or people for questioning at informal checkpoints. Street-corner lookouts and slow-moving trucks with tinted windows scout for outsiders at all times.

Soldiers from the Mexican Army, sent to combat the disorder, sleep in the Guadalupe and Praxedis town gyms, fortified with sandbags and armed sentries. They run infrequent patrols between the towns.

“Of course, I’m scared,” a short soldier says quietly as his unit searches a line of cars at one of several armed checkpoints.

At the eastern end of the municipality, the paved road ends in Porvenir. Jose Luis Guerrero, the mayor of Praxedis, sits in his kitchen, typing on his laptop and fielding constant calls. Outside, white transport trucks can be seen flowing endlessly along U.S. Interstate 10, just across the border.

Guerrero believes the local woes have less to do with drug cartel feuds and more to do with economic downturn. Increased investment would make a vast improvement, he said.

“I’d like to see some of the maquiladoras come here,” he said, referring to the Mexican-based factories that turn out U.S. goods at low cost, paying employees $5 a day, the country’s minimum wage. “We are now ready to say to the maquila owners, ‘We want you here. We are ready for you.’ ”

In 2011, contractors started work on a $133 million toll bridge that will cross from Tornillo, Texas, into the heart of the Valle de Juarez. The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) announced the new six-lane bridge, intended to increase bilateral trade, “will provide a more rapid route between major commercial and industrial centres in the United States and Mexico.”

But legal trade may not be all that would benefit from the new bridge. Rumours tie it to the arrival of La Nueva Gente. According to this speculation, the Sinaloans, having pushed out La Linea, will control a valuable entry point into the U.S. drug market, estimated at $40 billion.

Before the bridge can arrive, security on the Mexican side needs a giant overhaul. Mayor Guerrero, who now again has 10 unarmed, preventative police working for him in Praxedis, is optimistic this is already happening. But he’s one of a few.

The local priest, Father Eliseo Ramirez Soto, is much more cautious. “As long as there is corruption here, things aren’t going to change.”

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